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2025 North Dakota Travel Industry Conference
Feb 1 2025The 2025 North Dakota Travel Industry Conference will take place April 28-30 at the Grand Hotel Minot.The North Dakota Travel Industry Conference supports the state's tourism industry by bringing continuing education, renowned speakers, trainers, best practices, and peer-to-peer networking in a three-day conference format. This is the must-attend conference for...

Cultural Tourism and the Big Buck Contest
Jan 27 2025Tourism plays a pivotal part in a city’s economic growth. From the coal mining boom to the creation of Lake Sakakawea, tourism helped stabilize and expand Beulah since the 1950s. Lake Sakakawea alone brings in annual tourists for the North Dakota Governor’s Walleye Cup (July), Dakota Walleye Classic (July), and...

The Future of Farming is Here
Jan 18 2025Robotics and artificial intelligence: Words typically accompanied by the backdrop of a neon cityscape full of high rises and never-ending streams of cars flying past. From Bladerunner to The Jetsons, a future of technology is often predicated on ideas of sprawling, gritty urbanity, where wired, manufactured components replace biological structures...

Although homebuyers and home sellers continue to encounter headlines declaring the housing market a seller’s domain with national home prices at record highs, a closer analysis shows that several regional markets have shifted, offering homebuyers increased leverage.During the pandemic housing boom, spanning from summer 2020 to spring 2022, active home...

Armstrong’s executive budget highlighted by property tax relief, infrastructure and housing investments
Jan 15 2025Gov. Kelly Armstrong today presented his executive budget recommendations for the 2025-27 biennium, highlighting significant investments in property tax relief, housing and infrastructure, education opportunities for students, and other priorities.In testimony to the Joint House-Senate Appropriations Committee, Armstrong outlined a general fund budget of $6.6 billion and a total budget...

Economic development organizations take a multi-track approach to sustained community growth. Supporting local small businesses is frequently a top priority for intracommunity growth, and its importance grows in economic downturns or times of crisis. There are several ways to champion these enterprises no matter the size of the program budget...

USDA Continues Historic Commitment, Partnering with Rural Communities on Clean, Affordable Energy
Jan 10 2025Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack announced more than $6 billion in clean energy investments through the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s (USDA) Empowering Rural America (New ERA) and Powering Affordable Clean Energy (PACE) programs. Rural electric cooperatives and communities will use the funding to support thousands of jobs, lower electricity costs for...

The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) is providing a total of $14.4 million in grants and technical assistance through two separately funded projects to support urban agriculture and innovative production. USDA’s Office of Urban Agriculture and Innovative Production (OUAIP) is making available $2.5 million for Urban Agriculture and Innovative Production...

AI Challenges Traditional Site Selection
Jan 6 2025Tech disruption has become commonplace in every facet of life and commerce. Everyone is bombarded daily by new announcements of amazing new capabilities in generative artificial intelligence (AI), cybersecurity and predictive analytics. Yet how many of us are convinced that we can ask ChatGPT to choose the optimal location for...

New Year, New Discoveries
Jan 6 20252025 brings unique offerings and adventuresNew experiences will include the Enchanted Highway’s Knight & Dragon sculpture, ND’s largest mural (painted on grain silos), a 7-story hotel at 4 Bears Casino & Lodge, White Shield’s Son of Star Casino and the Bismarck Riverfront Festival Grounds.THINGS TO DOSnow Much Fun AwaitsNorth Dakota's...

How AI Can Change Your Business In 2025
Jan 6 2025It’s a new year, and big changes are on the horizon.In two weeks, Donald Trump will be sworn in as the 47th president, and a host of new policies that could deeply impact business are on the table. For years, Trump and his allies have talked about tax cuts for...

State of the States 2025
Jan 3 2025Well, it’s been quite a year. And as far as state economic development policies and news go, it’s about to be quite another year.Looking back and looking forward, among the themes to emerge across the 50 state legislatures are workforce housing, streamlining of permitting, child care, infrastructure and shovel-ready site...

From construction to healthcare to hospitality, the U.S. is grappling with a labor shortage, with 8.2 million job openings and only 7.2 million unemployed workers, according to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce.The post-pandemic labor landscape has seen a decline in participation in the workforce, prompting many to re-evaluate their career...

A saturated market presents business owners with unique challenges. It can be difficult for new businesses to break into a saturated market or for well-established businesses to increase their revenue. However, with SEO-driven content marketing strategies, you can capture more market share and add to your existing customer base.What is...

America’s metropolitan areas are resilient, and adaptable, but the economic power of the United States has been shifting to some new and surprising cities.Area Development’s 2024 Leading Metro Locations report, compiled with data from Chmura Economics & Analytics, provides an in-depth look at which cities are thriving, which regions are...
As the world grows increasingly reliant on technology, the United States faces an urgent challenge: breaking China’s dominance in the rare earth supply chain. Rare earth elements (REEs)—critical components in electric vehicles (EVs), wind turbines, and defense technologies—are abundant in the Earth's crust but notoriously difficult to mine and process...

Community collaboration is the genesis of many economic development organizations, but partnership efforts often stall at the regional level. Results-driven EDOs need to work through the barriers funding and geographic boundaries can present to drive returns. Forming strategic alliances with other groups, agencies, or local governments maximizes resources, allows for...

Gov. Kelly Armstrong welcomed news that President Joe Biden has approved North Dakota’s request for a presidential major disaster declaration to assist in recovery from historic wildfires that swept across parts of western North Dakota in early October, causing damage estimated at more than $8 million.In a Nov. 21 letter...

USDA Announces Final $300 Million in Automatic Assistance for Distressed Farm Loan Borrowers
Dec 20 2024The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) announced the final approximately $300 million in assistance to distressed direct and guaranteed farm loan borrowers under Section 22006 of the Inflation Reduction Act. Over the past two years, USDA acted swiftly to assist distressed borrowers in retaining their land and continuing their agricultural...

Looking Ahead: Predictions for 2025
Dec 19 2024Disruptive factors continue to push companies to mitigate risk in location decisions and build more resilient operating models. Read on for a preview of what Guild members predict for site selection projects in the year ahead.A Slowdown in MegaprojectsGuild members predict that the number of megaprojects will slow in 2025...

U.S. Department of Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack announced the second round of Regional Agricultural Promotion Program (RAPP) grants, which is intended to allocate $300 million to 67 partners once all legal and administrative requirements are satisfied, expanding American food and agricultural exports in emerging global markets. This latest investment brings...

The North Dakota Department of Commerce announces the Legacy Investment for Technology (LIFT) program’s One-Time Funding Round awards $1,044,000 to four companies in December. CorVent Medical (Fargo, ND) is the only U.S. owned and operated designer and manufacturer of mechanical ventilators. Awarded $296,500. Dynon Avionics (Fargo, ND) designs and manufactures avionics...

Armstrong: North Dakota sees continued growth with record population estimate of 796,568 in 2024
Dec 19 2024Gov. Kelly Armstrong announced that North Dakota’s population grew to a record high of 796,568 people as of July 1, 2024, marking the largest increase since 2020, according to population estimates released by the U.S. Census Bureau.The population estimate released today exceeds the original 2023 estimate of 783,926 residents by...

Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack today announced awards for more than $4.37 billion in clean energy investments through the United States Department of Agriculture’s (USDA) Empowering Rural America (New ERA) Program. Rural electric cooperatives will use the funding to support thousands of jobs, lower electricity costs for businesses and families and...